Bob Kerr: Is a Family Court ruling in the best interests of the child? Not this time

There is one clear, undeniable fact at the center of this sad, cruel story: A 16-month-old child was taken from the only home and the only mother she ever knew and sent to live with complete strangers.

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By
Bob Kerr
Posted Sep. 1, 2013 @ 12:01 am

There is one clear, undeniable fact at the center of this sad, cruel story:

A 16-month-old child was taken from the only home and the only mother she ever knew and sent to live with complete strangers in North Carolina.

This is such a twisted and heartless story, filled with mixed signals of hope and crushing disappointment. A little girl with no voice in determining the course of her life is allowed to form a strong bond with a woman who loves her, provides a good home for her and wants to adopt her. Then the Department of Children, Youth and Families and Family Court break the bond and leave a sobbing child reaching for her foster mother at T.F. Green Airport. And the foster mother has to walk away because foster mothers have absolutely no rights no matter how committed and caring they are.

The little girl was just seven days old in May 2011 when Kelly-Erin Kilmartin became her foster mother at Memorial Hospital in Pawtucket. The biological mother had been charged with neglect and DCYF had taken temporary custody. The biological mother returned to her home in North Carolina, where her other five children live with a relative.

Kilmartin is 44, a lawyer who decided to change careers and go to nursing school at Rhode Island College. She earned her degree and passed her boards. She is ready to be a nurse ó and a mother.

She remembers well the early days with the little girl she called AJ. She brought AJ home to her house in Glocester, part of a farm that has been in her family for a long time. Her parents live nearby and provided a lot of support.

And Kilmartin and the child became mother and daughter. Kilmartin says DCYF social workers would regularly assure her adoption was going to happen.

The really incredible thing here is that no one who saw Kilmartin and AJ, saw the way the foster mother and daughter connected, can argue that it was anything but an ideal situation for a kid who had a very bad break at birth. No one can say the home in North Carolina is in any way better or as good. And no one but no one can say how much damage is done to a 16-month-old girl who is pulled from her home and put on a plane.

When AJ was taken from her in October without notice, Kilmartin was asked by social workers to draw up a list of the childís likes and dislikes to help her new family in North Carolina. This is a small part of the list:

She loves oatmeal and brown rice mixed with fruit for breakfast.

She loves to swim and we go at least once a week.

She loves her stuffed animals and giving them hugs.

She doesnít like to wear hats.

Kilmartin even offered to go to North Carolina with AJ to make the transition easier. At first, DCYF said yes. Then it said no. So, there was the heartbreaking separation at the airport.

Itís all about kinship. Thatís whatís at the center of the decision to break up a good home in Rhode Island in favor of an uncertain one in North Carolina. Child-welfare laws always favor kinship placements whenever possible. And under an interstate compact with North Carolina, Rhode Island officials agreed that the aunt and AJís siblings in Greensboro provide the kinship.

The problem is the length of time it took to make the decision. Sixteen months is more than enough time to create a bond between foster mother and child that is strong and true and lasting. It happened with Kilmartin and AJ. And it made the break incredibly painful.

Stephanie Terry, associate director for child welfare at DCYF, said Rhode Island usually has a quick turnaround when it comes to making kinship placements. But with another state involved, the process can be slowed.

Terry concedes this was a very tough case, made more difficult by the length of time involved. And she acknowledges that, were she a foster mother, she would find it very hard to let go. What DCYF did, she said, in no way means that Kilmartin did not provide a wonderful home.

But itís in a childís best interests to be with siblings, said Terry, and officials in North Carolina decided that AJís relatives there were fit and able to take care of her.

In this case, of course, the kinship placement is with total strangers.

And Kilmartin did not allow the mad, one-sided process to move ahead without challenge. When it appeared that adoption was slipping away and the North Carolina relatives were moving for placement there, Kilmartin went to court to seek ďde facto parenthood,Ē which would give her a voice in the case.

ďI should be given some rights,Ē she said.

But she wasnít. Family Court Judge John Mutter denied her motion to intervene. But Mutter also provided the one official view that makes sense and shows compassion. He denied DCYFís request to take AJ out of Rhode Island and send her to North Carolina. According to Kilmartin, Mutter raised the question of questions: Why take a happy and contented 16-month-old child and put her with strangers?

But she was put with strangers. On Oct. 2, Family Court Chief Judge Haiganush Bedrosian took over the case and ruled that the child be sent to North Carolina. She cited the requirement that children be placed with siblings whenever possible.

Kilmartin says she is still fighting to find out exactly what AJís situation is in North Carolina, but the case has been officially closed by DCYF and information is hard to come by. She says there are times when she is tempted to head to Greensboro and knock on the door, but she knows that would not be a good idea.

Right now, she says, there is just a very big hole in her life.

ďI canít give up. I know what this is doing to her.Ē

She made a video of the parting at T.F. Green. It shows AJ in the arms of a DCYF social worker, crying and reaching for Kilmartin. And across the screen comes the question: ďIs this in the best interest of the child?Ē